I originally intended to post this under a more innocuous title like "Programming Note" or something...more on that in a second.
Yesterday at work I was watching TV when I stumbled upon SportsCenter, a popular athletic highlights show that is not so well-known that my computer thinks I've spelled it correctly. Anyway, one anchor, Mike Greenberg, asked baseball analyst and former New York Mets general manager Steve Phillips his opinion on Alex Rodriguez's return to the Yankees' lineup. (Rodriguez had missed three weeks with a strained quad.)
Seconds later, my jaw dropped. I don't remember Phillips' exact response. But I do know he said something along the lines of us having a situation here where the greatest player ever was returning to a team.
Immediately I had two thoughts: first, I have to blog about this, and second, he didn't really just say that, did he?
It's so dumb that I seriously did sit and wonder. Because the greatest player ever was Babe Ruth, and every kid in America who likes baseball knows this. Ruth could hit, field, and run. Let's take hitting: Rodriguez is 141st all-time in batting average, 108th in on-base percentage, and 12th in slugging percentage. Ruth? Ninth, second, and first.
Almost forgot. He could pitch, too. Ruth won 94 regular-season games with a career ERA of 2.28, and was 3-0, 0.87 in three World Series games. What does that give him, like six tools?
More to the point for Yankees fans, Ruth won the World Series seven times (four with New York). Rodriguez has never won a championship.
But forget all that. A-Rod will probably go down as the best player of this era, now that Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens have fallen so far out of public favor, and since other competitors for that title, like Greg Maddux, Ken Griffey, Jr., and Albert Pujols, never played for the Yankees. (I know Rodriguez looks a lot better than Maddux and Griffey right now, but let's see how things wind down for him.)
But best player ever? A-Rod wouldn't just have to beat Ruth for that title; he'd also have to be better than guys like Williams, Mays, Aaron, Mantle, DiMaggio, and Wagner, for starters. Since they play the same sport and therefore count, don't forget Cy Young and Walter Johnson. As baseball talks about its own history so much, you can't say all these guys just slipped Phillips' mind.
About the best that could have been said about A-Rod is that he was going to be the best shortstop ever before he moved to the Yankees and switched to third baseperson. I think I agree with this line of reasoning, and I've always thought he was a better fielder at short than Derek Jeter. I certainly thought he was going to surpass Honus Wagner or whoever else at short. But greatest player ever? That's just stupid.
Oh, and the reason I'm more sure now that Phillips said this is another reason I love the Internet. I Googled to see if anyone else heard what I did, and at least one guy did. I'm serious, it was so bad that I really wasn't sure, which is why I was going to de-sensationalize the headline, but this is good enough for me.
Comments
Alex Rodriguez is the greatest baseball player of this generation and by the time he is done playing, possibly of all time.
As you pointed out, A-Rod doesn't really have a great career batting average, so I don't even think you could really make the argument that he could be the best OFFENSIVE player ever. He could, however, become the new homerun king, which is certainly no small task.
I think A-Rod will only go down as the best player of this era IF we don't find out he's been popping greenies this whole time (I don't think he has been, but you never know these days). It's really too bad that Griffey Jr. was so injured so often because I really think he could've given A-Rod a run for his money as best player of this era.
Blaine, I didn't get into the steroids stuff because I think it's unfair to assume guilt, but also because I think that even with his likely accomplishments he's behind not only Ruth, but in my mind Williams and Mays as well. So to me it sort of doesn't matter anyway. (And if he IS using, it invites comparisons to Bonds—and I think Bonds wins that one easily. And maybe I should put Bonds ahead anyway, since he didn't break any rules we know of, but that's a whole other topic.)
As for the old-timers, A-Rod is ahead of Williams and Ruth on defense, but I think their edge on offense is bigger. (Williams is seventh all-time in batting average, first in on-base, and second in slugging.) Mays' final .302/.384./.557 is close to A-Rod's current .306/.388/.577, but he has 12 Gold Gloves. Rodriguez has two, and his last was in 2003. A-Rod was a pretty good shortstop, but Mays' defense is legendary.
A-Rod's argument as greatest of all-time looks better when he's considered as a shortstop, since many shortstops are poor hitters and he gives his team a huge edge there, but he's not a shortstop anymore. Even if he was, I still think he's behind at least the three guys I mentioned.
1) The Yankees, and everything affiliated with them, is completely overhyped. Could a guy who can't get it done in the post-season and has never won a title be called the greatest player ever if he still played for the Mariners?
2) SportsCenter, like the ESPN network, is a total hype machine that places perception above reality.
3) Steve Phillips is a tool.
There is NO WAY A-Rod is the greatest player ever, and in my book it remains to be seen if he is even the greatest player of his generation. I have always considered him the Peyton Manning of baseball - hyped up from a young age, puts up some gaudy numbers when the games don't really count, and can't get it done in the playoffs.
Most tellingly, every Yankees fan I know agrees that A-Rod has been a huge disappointment because of his failure to bring home the title. He isn't even the greatest Yankee ever.
And, of course, there is the issue of defense - A-Rod's is very good, but it isn't nearly as good as Mays' or even Ruth's, particularly when you consider Ruth's pitching ability.
I don't think it's fair to fault one position player for not winning a title, but A-Rod has underperformed in the postseason for New York. I think I remember reading once that Ruth was ripped for playing poorly in the World Series once (probably in 1922, when he was 2-for-17), which just proves that Yankees fans were frigtards even then. But the guy hit .326 with 15 homers in the Series for his career in addition to those pitching wins, so I guess I'm saying Babe Ruth was the freakin' man.
Babe Ruth was "the freakin' man."
DG